Agreed. The days of "Made in the USA" or "Made in Japan" are long gone. Nobody cares about quality (only cost), and then you have consumers complain 2 or 3 years down the road (or sooner) why their product malfunctions all the time, etc.
Some people have made the transition to SSD drives. Although I've only had two traditional platter drives go bust on me since I started computing over a decade ago (a Jasmine Direct 80 drive in 2009, and that Hitachi 320GB drive last year), I would ultimately like to make the transition to SSD, as I too am not impressed with the quality of traditional hard drives manufactured today. A hard drive one of the most important components in a computer, and as such should be manufactured properly. However, you have to look at the economics of production/distribution, as well as the devastating effects a not-prone-to-failure drive would have on the service industry to find your answer as to why things are assembled the way they are.
In regards to the China factor, not every product I've owned from China has been a dud. My Canon i560 bubblejet (which I had for 7 years) worked perfectly up until the print heads no longer functioned, and I couldn't justify the $50 plus tax replacement for the heads, considering the cost of the printer was $99 when purchased new in 2004. Then there's my Visioneer PaperPort VX scanner (also made in China), which is about 14 years old, and still scans documents with great precision. Maybe these were one of the few products that were actually manufactured properly, or I know how to maintain my products well beyond their production cycle.
Speaking of forgotten manufacturers- does anyone here remember Quantum? I haven't seen a new Quantum drive in about 6 years, so I am under the assumption they filed for bankruptcy, or merged with another manufacturer.